Writing by the seat of my pants at last!

[carole gill]

and loving it.
Okay, I'm getting some good stuff down. Know why? Because of some great advice you crimespacers have given me.
It's a totally new experience and I feel free and so much more creative.
Okay, so what's the question? Well--it's this: I don't feel the need to make copious notes on my characters--like their likes and dislikes and where they go to eat sushi.
I find (and I've written five chapters in the last couple of days), that I have a good idea in my head of what they are etc. Just as I have a vague idea of the storyline.
Any opinions? You seat of the pants writers--should I just go with the flow and kick the angst to the curb?
thank you guys in advance.

[carole gill]

If "she's" allergic, I'll take the whole pie! seriously, thanks so much for that. I'm on a roll. And you're so right about the notes for each chapter and the character, after I came back down to earth this week,I started to do that. thanks again Deirdre! all the best.

[Steven Craigh]

I was at a writer's conference yesterday and there was a panel of 4 crime writers. this question was put to them: do you write by the seat of your pants, or do you need to know where you're going when you start, and exactly how it's going to end. the split was exactly 50:50. 2 had to know in exact detail where the story was going, how it would end and everything in between (however they both said they trust their instincts if they go astray along the way) and the other 2 said they could never write if they knew what was going to happen. 1 just loved surprises, and admitted he had many abandoned manuscripts but that the completed ones were more fresh and rewarding, he felt. The other said that the one time she tried planning she felt she'd already gotten the story out and there was no longer a need to tell it. Consensus was: there's no right or wrong way; each writer works differently. But of interest, the planners both said they wished they could write impulsively like the others, expressing admiration.

[L.J. Sellers]

I have an odd mix of styles. I always have a basic storyline in mind when I start out. Then I outline in more detail as I write the first few chapters. (I had an agent once who was emphatic about outlines!) As for characters, I let them develop as I write (often according to the needs of the story).

[carole gill]

yes, Lynn. that's the key thing--only recently did I realize: I find writing spontaneously permits me to satisfy the needs of the story. what I had been doing was the reverse.
interesting about the odd mix of styles.
Agents must like outlines. they probably can't imagine going by the pants seat! interesting.
thanks for that.

[carole gill]

by carole gill 1 second ago

yes, I agree. it's interesting that it's 50 50. I would have figured that.
I always used to plan and never liked what I got! This past summer I planned and wrote an entire first draft and wound up hating it!
then last month I just started writing and it's been going pretty well and all spontaneously.
so I'm sticking with that, but careful about notes to not go off rails.
thanks so much for that.

[Steven Craigh]

the book i'm writing at the moment is part of a mentorship i won through the institution where i'm studying, and one of the problems i'm having is that my supervisor insisted on having a complete outline before i began in earnest, so detailed that it was chapter by chapter. now how am i supposed to know that in chapter 33 the murderer makes a mistake leading the protagonist to discover his identity? nevertheless i wrote the outline and have been trying to stick to it, but the writing is like pulling teeth now, because i feel like i've told that story already (in the outline) and my creative self wants to get on with making up some other story, every bit as interesting, and so it keeps wanting to go off in different directions. but you know, i'm not blaming my supervisor. the criteria of the mentorship is that any approved projects have to have a detailed outline first; it just isn't geared to how all writers work.
strange i always thought i was a planner, but i know now i'm a planner as far as researching tools, methods, environment, place, scene, setting, motive, character traits etc, but not plot. there are things i want my characters to do, and key scenes i know will be in there, even some lines i want delivered, but finding my way to them is half the fun.
but i have this outline and i'm sticking with it for now, as painful as it is. but i'm going to stray from it if my instincts lead me elsewhere. you know i just have to come back to the best advice (writing not life) i ever received, from a teacher i had in my final year of high school: "trust your head, your heart and your gut... in reverse order. always go with your gut reaction." he knew what he was talking about. to me the best writing is visceral; it should provoke an emotional response in the reader, and sometimes your brain can't write as well as your gut instinct (by guts i mean the seat of primordial fear) can.... Plus, your guts are closer to the seat of your pants, right?

[carole gill]

Yes! guts are def closer to the pants area! What a predicament for you! and i thought i have probs! my main problem is I'm New York born and bred and have lived in the U.K. so long it has created a problem for me as to where to set my novel--but enough of me--
so how will you manage? say, you don't follow the instructions--and you write a masterpiece. is some little worm going to hold the completed masterpiece in one hand and the old outline in another and say: Ah huh! You strayed! off with his head!
I guess it might disqualify you from the project? that's more logical.
If at all possible, what I would do is I'd write how I wanted to write. otherwise it's like writing with a pail over your head, wearing mittens!
go with you instincts.
here's something that made an impression on me--I used to take certain advice about creating copious character profiles--I'd write what they ate, where they went to school and so on. and still not like where it was going.
but then when I started the old seat of the pants, I found I could pen someone that day and I knew (instinctively) all about them. Guts again.
best of luck and stick with your instincts! **'em!

[Dana King]

I fall into the Detailed Planner category, but I think what they're making you do is just stupid. It's like saying everyone has to wear the same size shoes. Insistence on adherence to arbitrary rules - ANY rules - for creative writing is an oxymoron.

[L.J. Sellers]

Agreed. It's stifling. Even if I have an ending all mapped out, if I get a better idea half-way through the story, I toss the plan and go with the better idea. What agent or editor would argue with that?

[Mari Sloan]

Go with it! Rewrite cures inconsistencies and fills in. Too much preoccupation with minor details will keep you from advancing your plot. If your hero/heroine is staring down the barrel of a gun, no one may be that interested in whether they eat sushi at all.

[Vikki Petraitis]

The more writers that you listen to, the more you realise that everyone does it their own way, and the way has to work for you. A lot of these rules such as listing your characters' favourite foods work as scaffolding for beginning writers. Once we've been doing it for a while, we don't need the support any more.

[carole gill]

that's true. but what I'm finding with my wip (the first time I have ever gone by the seat, etc... is that I KNOW what their fav foods would be bec ause they come to life on the page when I write about them. It's amazing. I agree, that it definitely is advice for beginners though. And I suppose it's excellent advice, but after a while the seat of the pants syndrome might begin to take over!